As part of the consultation process for The Flyover, We Make Places facilitated The Flyover Fest (July 2014) which offered a practical re-imagining of the space. The road was closed for a day and the city was given the opportunity to see and experience the Churchill Way Flyover as it’s never been experienced before. The Fest was a quick fire, collective effort of the creative citizens of Liverpool, which was organised in less than 4 weeks. Working with artists, musicians, theatre companies, gardeners, hydroponic farmers, yarnbombers and local activists, over 3,000 attendees saw the flyover become an animated, striking and beautiful place to be.

The Flyover Fest had a dual purpose, to engage more people in the Friends of the Flyover campaign by harnessing their views, and to illustrate to those in positions of power that an alternative use for the space would be possible, and would be popular, having a beneficial effect on the city both in economic and atmospheric terms.

The outcome is that we now have the blessing of the Mayor to close the Flyover to traffic on a regular basis as we continue to develop our project.

We created this beautiful infographic to document the day and have put some of our favourite images on here for you to scroll through too: